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Preview: Modern Market

My good friend came up with a brilliant New Year’s resolution: make Mondays great again. She’s modified her routine to make her Monday night feel like an extension of the weekend, by committing to sharing a homemade, gourmet meal with her fiancé and a bottle of wine.

Taking a cue from her positive outlook, I too have tried to make a conscious effort to make Mondays magical. That’s an exaggeration, but I have committed to a routine of CorePower Yoga after work and a homemade healthy meal with my husband, to reset from a typically hectic weekend.

This Monday, I decided to take it up a notch and begin my week with a proper lunch break and took a half hour to catch-up with my good friend, Lauren. We met at Modern Market, the new fast-casual establishment near McPherson Square, to try their lunch menu, on-the-house.

For a joint with “Modern” in their namesake, I have to say I expected the decor and vibe to be more sleek and minimalist. The small space was a bit disjointed, as you had to shuffle to a smaller bottle-necked space to place your order. We did like the wooden accents, but the bright patterned booths cheapens the ambiance.

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The menu offers salads, soups, brick oven pizza, toasted sandwiches, and sides like as mac and cheese and garlic mashed potatoes. We also noticed the $3 house wine on the menu and wished we weren’t smack in the middle of our work days.

I withheld from ordering wine, but in an effort to make my drink choice more exciting than water, I had the Elderflower Kombucha on tap. We learned the flavor changes seasonally, so if I worked closer to Modern Market, I would definitely swing by often to treat myself to a kombucha on the go.

We both attempted to kick-off our week on a healthy foot, so we ordered two different salads–the Toscano with proscuitto, roasted grape tomato, cucumber, marinated cannellini beans, pickled onion, Grana Padano, romaine, and a roasted garlic rosemary vinaigrette, and the Fiesta with romaine, roasted chicken, sweet corn, black bean salsa, avocado, Pepper Jack cheese, radish, and a red pepper basil vinaigrette. We appreciated the calorie count listed next to each entree on the menu, for better or worse.

I was also in the mood for something warm, so I tried the cashew squash soup, which tasted like a lighter version of a broccoli cheddar soup. It was delicious and the perfect size to accompany our salads.

Speaking of the salads, they were massive! Lauren actually ended up taking half of her salad home to eat for dinner. Her chicken was cooked well and the toppings were fresh, but we both felt like our salads were way oversaturated with dressing, despite that we asked for them to be light on the dressing.

We both agreed if we worked closer to Modern Market, we would treat ourselves to a pizza and wine lunch on a Friday, because really every week day should be magical.

Modern Market D.C.
1010 Vermont Ave. N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20005

Stephanie

Former DC Editor in Chief

Steph is the former DC editor in chief and is known for having a good eye, a sharp wit, and an eclectic palate.